Eaglet cut free in rescue operation
A baby eagle snagged on fishing line in its Vancouver Island nest has been successfully freed in a rescue operation Thursday.
A three-tonne crane was manoeuvred into position under the tree near Sidney, B.C., and the eaglet was cut free, removed from the nest briefly and put back.
The rescuers were hoping to free the bird's leg and leave the eaglet in place with its two siblings and two parents, but were prepared to bring it down for nurturing at a wildlife reserve. That plan turned out not to be necessary.
"It was a very, very successful operation," said biologist David Hancock, whose foundation has placed webcams near the nest and close to eagle nests in several other locations in southwestern B.C.
Hancock was one of the two men aboard the crane platform, along with Jeff Krieger, an employee with a wildlife rescue company, who actually plucked the bird out of the nest after cutting the line.
Hancock said the line around the animal's leg was not wound too tightly and so had not cut off circulation. He removed the line from the three-kilogram bird, doused the leg in disinfectant and put it back into the nest.
Hancock said the eaglet's parents, who remained close by throughout the rescue effort, would not reject the baby because it came into contact with humans.
"Eagles have no sense of smell, that's why they can eat rotten fish that you can't even get near the river with," Hancock said."They have no worries about smelling human scent."
Within 90 minutes of the rescue, one of the parent eagles was seen on the webcam feeding the eaglets in the nest.
The struggle of the eaglet had been broadcast live online by the webcam mounted near the edge of the nest.
The animal's predicament had prompted calls from concerned viewers around the world for Hancock's foundation to mount a rescue.
But the operation at first seemed impossible because the nest is at the top of dead tree that is too dangerous to climb, and the ground around the nest was too soft to support a crane tall enough to reach it.
But the ground had dried by Thursday afternoon and special heavy-duty mats were brought in to help support the huge machine.
Hancock had dubbed the eaglet Donald, after bombastic U.S. billionaire Donald Trump because the eaglet had been the bully of the three siblings in the nest before it became entangled.
But it also received the name Flyer by a class of Sidney area elementary school students who were watching the drama on the Internet.
Hancock said when he got to the nest Thursday, he found Donald a bit thinner than the other two eaglets.
He said he and Krieger kept the injured eaglet in a bucket for several minutes while debating whether to bring it down to the ground for treatment or do the job in the air.
Hancock and Krieger were greeted with applause when their steel bucket touched the ground.
Hancock estimated hundreds of millions of people have been watching this pair of eagles over the six years he has broadcast their nesting habits live. The nest is one of four featured on www.hancockwildlife.org
